Halfway through the second series of
Higurashi no naku koro ni -- where they talk a great deal about resisting fate and saving each other. Naturally, there are some declarations like 「いつか思い出さなければなれないとしても、今はその時ではないのです。」 -- "Even if someday you have to remember, today is not the time."
One of the funny things about Japanese is the way that sentences like "I have to do this" get constructed. The structure, once you expand the contractions and fill in contextual bits, translates more literally to "if I don't do this, the future will not come to pass." That's right. Everything depends on you. The very fabric of reality is at stake.
It's a trite observation, but it really adds a layer of bombast to the translation in my head, even though a native speaker would consider it perfectly normal. I like to think of it as a little bonus.
More on
Higurashi later, after I've gotten the Fanime stuff posted.
words from chris, 2009-06-03 02:22:03, los angeles
